


Ladies, Tonight We Riot

by for_darkness_shows_the_stars



Series: What Comes After [5]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Badass Katara (Avatar), Gen, I'm so proud of the swt ladies it's making me tearbend, Katara (Avatar)-centric, Not Canon Compliant - The Legend of Korra, Not Compliant with Avatar Comics, Post-Canon, Sokka and Katara love eachother so much it makes me tear up, The Southern Water Tribe - Freeform, Women Being Awesome, the ladies of the swt beat feminism into their men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-24
Updated: 2020-10-24
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:14:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,331
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27177073
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/for_darkness_shows_the_stars/pseuds/for_darkness_shows_the_stars
Summary: The ladies of the Southern Water Tribe have survived for two years without their men. Now that the war is over, some are eager to return to status quo. Some ... not so much.Or; Katara leads a revolt.
Relationships: Katara & Sokka, Katara & The Southern Water Tribe
Series: What Comes After [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1981828
Comments: 20
Kudos: 260





	Ladies, Tonight We Riot

After a month of celebrations and negotiations in the Fire Nation, Katara and Sokka returned home. They have been absent for nearly a year, and the South Pole had become nearly unrecognizable—Pakku and his waterbenders have done wonders to the village, and though it was still a far cry from the glory of their sister-tribe in the North, it still warmed their hearts to see the place they grew up in bustling with activity. Immediately, they both set to work, Katara lending her skills as a master waterbender in rebuilding, as Sokka began drawing up the plans for an easily defendable city.

She’d snatched a few glances at his ideas. He’d drawn inspiration from the Northern Tribe, the Caldera, Ba Sing Se, and just about every other location they’d visited, but the underlying feel was so very _Water Tribe_ that Katara felt the urge to draw her brother into a hug.

In many ways, the idea was … impossible. The war, which had consumed her entire life, her parents’ lives, her grandparents’ lives, and their parents’ before them … was over. The world was at _peace_. After a hundred years’ worth of bloodshed, it was finally at balance, and the nations were eager to reconnect, re-establish the ancient trade routes and agreements. It was not uncommon to see Earth Kingdom pottery or Fire Nation jewellery advertised on the markets. Her best friends were the Avatar and the Firelord. She was a bender of unparalleled skill, a war hero, somebody whose voice _mattered_.

Her father was _home_.

And so were all the men who’d sailed away to fight in the war.

* * *

“My, my, is that little Kat?” Horuk said, squinting at her approaching from. There was a new scar on his face, a long, thin white line that cut a path across his jawline. She didn’t remember him having it when he left to fight the Fire Nation. But she had been very young back then.

“That’s me,” answered Katara, stopping a few paces in front of him. He was sitting in front of his newly constructed igloo—her own work, in cooperation with one of the boys Pakku had brought from the North—mending a net.

“Tui and La, you’ve grown,” Horuk said, looking her up and down. “A mirror image of Kya, I tell you. You must be driving the boys crazy, eh?” He grinned, and Katara fought the instinctive urge to reach for her throat and the round pendant that rested there as Yon Rha’s face flashed before her eyes.

“Erm … Look, I’m actually here about what you said at the Council of Elders meet—”

“Yeah, yeah,” Horuk interrupted. “I saw you there. Did you have fun, listening to the Elders?”

Katara bristled. “I wasn’t just listening! I am a valued member of this Tribe! I am a—”

As she ranted, Horuk just smiled, like a father watching a toddler try to crawl. It made her see red.

“Oh, before I forget—” he said, “one of your dad’s buttons fell off this morning at the docks.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out an ivory circle, the patterns carved into it with delicate care long since worn off. “Be a dear and mend that when you get home, will you?”

“But this is important, it’s about the oncoming visit from Earth Kingdom dignitaries—”

Horuk just gave her another patronizing smile. He reached for her hand and pressed the button into her glove—had she been a firebender, it would have burst into the flames from the sheer intensity of her glare.

“Don’t you worry about that, darling girl. The men will deal with the Earth Kingdom.”

Girl?

_Girl?_

She’d freed the World Spirit from a hundred-year confinement with the sheer force of her righteous rage and travelled the world by his side, became a waterbending master in a few short months and taught the art to the Avatar himself, looked into the eyes of the Northern Council and told them to _go fuck themselves_ , defeated a prodigy royal firebender as Sozin’s Comet painted the skies crimson, spoke to the Earth King and freed Ba Sing Se from Long Feng’s yoke, hiked through the Serpent’s Pass and wandered the sacred halls of Wan Shi Tong’s forgotten library, watched as a power-thirsty lunatic killed the moon and how a courageous princess gave her life to save it.

She was betrayed by a boy she might’ve loved, and watched him die, knowing she could do nothing, faced off against the monster who had killed her mother and had the strength to leave him to his miserable life, impersonated a spirit and was thanked for it, got herself captured so she could free an entire prison barge, played kingmaker to the Firelord, built herself a family out of abandoned and the castoffs.

She loved, and lost, and killed, and _lived_.

She was fifteen, and Horuk was fifty-one, and she had lived more _life_ in ten months than he had in his five decades.

She was anything but a _darling girl_.

Horuk … was still smiling.

* * *

She was too big for this place, stifled with the ways of before imposed by those who wanted to keep it small. The men had all went away two years ago, and now that they were back, they expected the world to have remained the same.

She was a twelve year-old girl when they left—and it was that twelve year-old girl who could barely levitate a blob of water they remembered. Frightened, desperate, _powerless._

Katara was not powerless, or weak, or helpless.

And she had decided, two months ago, watching as the Head Fire Sage lowered the five-pronged crown of the Firelord into Zuko’s topknot, that she would build a world where no little girl will ever have to feel like that again. She had the influence, and the motivation to _make_ this ravaged world into something worth living in, and so La help her, she would do it.

* * *

“Hey, Katara!” Tukluk, the young warrior with a blue bead hanging from his left ear and a disarming smile called, dropping a heap of fabric into her arms. “Be a dear and help my sister wash this, will you?”

Katara blinked. “I’m busy.”

“C’mon, Kat,” he drawled, giving her one of those signature smirks that had the northern girls swooning “It’s just a few shirts.”

Katara raised a brow—and dropped the clothes into the snow. “I’m _busy_ ,” she enunciated carefully, and turned on her heel, making her way to the City Hall.

She heard Tukluk muttering behind her back.

She refused to give him the satisfaction of acknowledging it.

* * *

She wasn’t the only one who thought so.

For two years, the women and the elderly of the Tribe had survived without their men and their warriors. They learned to be self-sufficient, developed a new way of life hitherto unknown to the Water Tribes—simply because they had no need of it before. But they’d survived.

And they had changed … for the better, in Katara’s opinion, even if some Elders didn’t necessarily agree. But now that the men were back, it was like they expected the things to magically revert to the ways they had been before.

Like that was even possible!

Like the women would ever allow that.

* * *

“And I told him—if you don’t want to do your own mending, I suppose you’ll be walking around with holes in your clothes, because I’m _not_ doing it until he shows some appreciation for the work put into everything!” Nauja ranted, elbows deep in a basin of soapy water at the communal washroom. “And do you know what he said?”

“What?” Bitta asked from behind the huge clean pile of clothes she was checking for holes.

“He said that _I_ should be grateful for the food he puts on the table! Ha!” She scoffed. “Then I told him, _respectfully_ , _Atukka, brother mine, if you stop hunting, I’ll just start doing it myself, but if I stop mending, you’re going to freeze to death._ ”

“I had the _same_ discussion with Kiraka!” Hikko bit out, folding. “And don’t even let me start on my father!”

“Your father,” Katara scoffed. “He keeps handing me bloody buttons to mend while I’m trying to catch him alone to talk about the Earth Kingdom delegation!” She was using her bending to dry the washed cloth, stripping it of every single water molecule—perhaps a bit too forcefully, but she needed to take her frustration out on _something_ , and none of the benders Pakku had brought with him could give her even a half-decent spar. “I swear to La, if I don’t go Azula on him one of these days …”

“ _Go Azula_ …” Bitta chuckled. “I think I’d like to see that.”

Katara rolled her eyes. “Look, Azula may be a sadist and a tyrant, but she _never_ let anyone push her around.”

“It’s like they think they’re irreplaceable,” Hikko snorted. “How do they think we survived for two years without them?”

“They don’t _think_ ,” Nauja scoffed. “Don’t get me wrong, I am very glad they’re back and not in constant danger anymore, but Tui and La, sometimes it was easier without them.”

Katara chuckled. “Say that again. And it’s always, _oh, did you meet any cute boys on your travels? Oh, the boys must be throwing themselves at you! Oh, boys, boys, **boys**_. I _saved the world_. _Boys_ were the last thing on my mind while I did it!”

Hikko smiled. “I get your frustration, Katara, but could you go easier on my husband’s shirt?”

“Oh? _Oh._ ” It had frozen into an icy board. She melted it instantly, and drew the water out, then threw it at Bitta’s pile. “My point still stands!”

“Yeah …” Nauja sighed. “It does.”

* * *

If the southern women were angry, the northern immigrants were stunned. Sometimes, it really pained Katara to see girls her age with blue ribbons like hers wound around their throats, but whereas hers was the memory of a beloved mother, theirs were nooses binding them to men they had no choice but to marry.

She had proposed a motion to the Council of the Elders as soon as they began arriving, a motion that would see all arranged betrothals broken off should a family wish to relocate to the Southern Water Tribe.

The Elders were still debating, but Katara knew she at least had Gran-Gran’s vote for this.

But where the southern women were indignant by the men’s presumptions, the northern were bewildered by their wilfulness. For all that they have been all but decimated by the Southern Raiders, Katara was really glad her Tribe never went into seclusion the way their northern counterpart did. Cut off from the rest of the world, they fell back on their traditions, turning them as rigid and as unyielding as ice itself.

There were several female waterbenders among the northern immigrants, and Katara had personally offered to teach every single one of them both healing and combat bending. At first, all of them had refused, but over the next two days, two girls, both sixteen, both with blue ribbons at their necks, sought her out.

She was teaching them in secret, away from the prying eyes of their fathers.

Katara was very proud of their progress. Neither of them was a prodigy like Katara herself was, and it never ceased to amaze her that for these girls, learning combat bending in a matter of months wasn’t a matter of life and death.

She had done that. She and her makeshift, broken little family. They had made a world where learning to fight was not the only way to survive.

* * *

“It’s just— _ah_! It’s so infuriating!” she lamented to Sokka. “I may be young, but I’ve seen more of the world than he has! And he _sends me home with a button to mend_!”

“… I can try to mend that for you?” he offered timidly.

“That’s not the point!” she snapped.

Sokka seemed to deflate. “I know … I’m sorry. But hey,” he elbowed her lightly in the ribs, “if there’s anyone who can change half of the Tribe’s whole worldview, it’s you. And …” Here, her brother gave her a soft smile. “ _I_ ’ll never turn my back on you.”

The echo of a memory, a decrepit Fire Nation village, hiding her face behind a veil … and her brother, and his unwavering support.

She threw her arms around Sokka. “I think … I think I may have a plan.”

* * *

“You understand, of course,” Katara told him, hours later, “that you can’t be exempt.”

Sokka grinned, the smile she had seen countless times before, and it _never_ bode well for the enemy. “I wouldn’t have it any other way, baby sister.”

She chuckled. “Stop that!”

* * *

“Ladies,” Katara said to Hikko and Bitta, fists on her hips, and a smirk on her lips. “Tonight, we riot. Spread the word.”

* * *

“What’s that smell?” Atukka asked in wonder as he made his way over to where his sister was leaning over a pot. Whatever was inside smelled _heavenly._

“Polar rabbit-dog stew,” Nauja replied evenly. “With some spices I found at the market yesterday. Honestly, re-opening of the trade routes is probably one of the best thing about the war’s end.”

Atukka smirked. “Not the return of your most beloved brother?”

“No, not really,” Nauja said, shrugging, and peppered the stew with some spice or the other.

“Ha-ha, very funny, Nauja,” he said, rolling his eyes. “Wait … where’d you get a polar rabbit-dog?”

Nauja’s blue eyes found his, and she curved a single brow. “I caught it, obviously.” _You idiot_ was only implied, but Atukka followed her line of sight to where a freshly-cleaned spear was leaning against the wall.

“ _You_ caught it,” Atukka echoed flatly.

“No, it just so happened to wander into my pot already skinned,” she retorted. “Honestly, ‘Tukka, how much clearer can I be?”

“Erm … okay, so I guess I don’t need to go out hunting for food tomorrow?” he tried.

“Nope,” Nauja said, still fully focused on her stew. “I caught enough to last us a week at the _least_ , and it’s still a month before we have to start gathering for the winter.”

“Oh … I guess I’ll just … _tiger-seals_!” He grinned. “You know how much we both love seal jerky.”

Nauja smiled. “Great idea. You can start preparing the tiger-seals Bitta and I caught this morning. I haven’t had the time yet.”

Atukka frowned. “ _Preparing_?”

“If you don’t want to do that, I guess there’s a lot of mending to be done. You’ve been neglecting your clothes, brother mine.”

“But I—” he spluttered, “I don’t _mend_ clothes! I don’t even know how!”

Nauja’s smile was downright _terrifying_. “Well, then I suggest you get started on the tiger-seals. And tomorrow, I’ll show you how to mend, so you can do it all by yourself from now on.”

* * *

“Good morning, ladies!” Sokka exclaimed, as he proudly entered the communal washroom with a bundle of blue fabric in his arms. “Hikko. Kirra. Linna. How may I be of assistance? And let me tell, you, I’m _exceptional_ at finding holes. I have a whole _process_.”

He was greeted with three stares, each a unique mixture of befuddled, amused, and exasperated. The ladies, however, decided to take his word for his abilities, and put him before a huge pile of clean clothes.

Methodically, Sokka examined every item for holes and tears, and after a while, got involved with the women’s conversation. “You mean to tell me,” he gasped, “that Arluk and Nauja have _a thing_?”

“Shhh!” Kirra hissed. “They think no one knows, and it’s best to keep it that way.”

“They’re going to be so _cute_ together,” Hikko said dreamily.

Sokka considered, and after much careful examination, agreed with Hikko completely. Not as cute as he and Suki, _naturally_ , but it’s not like that was easy.

Ah …

Suki …

* * *

“Why, isn’t it little Kat again!” Horuk beamed. “Have you fixed Hakoda’s button yet?”

“No,” Katara said neutrally. “I did, however, bring you this.” From behind her, she pulled out the button, and her father’s parka. “Since fixing it means so much to you, and you clearly have the time, why don’t you do it? And while you’re at it, I _really_ need to talk to you about the arrival of Earth Kingdom delegates, because if you keep _slapping arriving dignitaries on the back_ as a sign of welcome, they’re going to be really insulted, and then we can kiss the deal goodbye. In fact, here,” she handed him a thin scroll embedded with Water Tribe insignia, “is a guide to the way a proper Tribesman is meant to greet dignitaries from the other nations. Study it, will you?”

Her smile was as sweet as honey, and as sharp as her icicles. “Don’t ruin this for the Tribe, okay?” And then she turned on her heel and marched away, leaving a bemused Horuk behind.

* * *

“Katara,” Hakoda began at dinner one day. It was by no means a good dinner, as it was her and Gran-Gran’s first attempt at teaching Sokka how to cook, and while her brother may be a tactical genius, a cook, he was not. “The men have been coming to me with some odd complaints recently.”

“Oh?” Katara said innocently, stirring her five-flavour soup (that may have turned into an indeterminable-amount-of-flavours-soup at some point during the preparation process). “How so?”

“Well,” Dad said, “it appears they are beginning to feel … unneeded.”

Gran-Gran hid her chuckle with a healthy gulp of water and a cough that had Pakku gently patting her on the back. Sokka concealed his own smile much less successfully, by ducking his head, but all of Dad’s attention was on Katara.

“Apparently, their wives and sisters have begun doing the work that is traditionally theirs, and have been expecting them to … partake in the work that is traditionally the women’s.” He curved a brow. “You wouldn’t happen to know anything about this, would you?”

Katara shrugged. “I don’t know, Dad … that seems natural.” She _continued_ stirring her soup.

“Oh?”

“Well … yes. I mean, with all of you gone, the women had to pick up the slack. That means _hunting_ , and _fighting_ , and pretty much everything that you used to do.” She shrugged again. “The Tribe changed while you were gone, Dad, and so has the world. You can’t reasonably expect it to go back to the way it was. And I mean … is it _really that weird_ that, when the women are hunting, they expect the men to help with the washing and the mending and the cooking and whatnot? If anything _they’re_ being the unreasonable ones.” She took a sip of her soup, and flavour exploded on her tongue. She was fairly certain Sokka had added fire-flakes at some point. _Why_ , she couldn’t fathom.

Dad’s lip curled almost imperceptibly. “I suppose they are.”

* * *

Yalla’s water-whip was improving rapidly, as Senna used her bending to form and direct dozens of icicles at once. Pride bloomed in Katara’s chest at the sight of it. Just as they were about to part for tonight, a soft, timid voice reached her ears.

“Master Katara?”

A girl, no older than twelve, emerged from the shadows.

“Yes?”

“I’m Kalli … and I would like you to teach me how to waterbend … if that’s okay.”

Katara smiled.

“Of course, Kalli. It would be my honour to be your bending master.”

* * *

When a massive ship docked in the newly-constructed port a few weeks later, its sails vibrant green and its hull bulky, not like the lithe Water Tribe sailboats, the dignitaries wrapped in dark furs and greens were greeted with formal bows not used in a century.

As they were led to the shining icy City Hall, they could witness the Tribeswomen teaching their brothers and husbands and sons how to cook, how to wash, how to mend and sew. And should their eyes fall upon the young immigrant girls, they might note the distinct lack of blue ribbons around their throats.

**Author's Note:**

> So this is mostly based on my interpretation of the SWT culture to be more progressive than the NWT, (I am and will forever be, a fan of the Chief Kya theory), and that the biggest issue with it are the strict gender roles (as opposed to the arranged marriages, and being forbidden from learning combat bending, and we can only assume, regular combat as well, in the North). 
> 
> And obviously, when all the men left to fight in the War, the women and the elderly didn't suddenly stop needing food and the other stuff the men did before. So they learned to adapt.
> 
> I hope you enjoyed!!!
> 
> [Tumblr.](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/view/stars-and-darkness)


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